


eight hours away

by nocturneatmidnight



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Relationship, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, checkmate mentions and the like, izuleo live together in florence change my mind, leo didn't come home in his recent scout so i get to make him suffer, this fic made me do math i can't believe it god fuck timezones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 05:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29147952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nocturneatmidnight/pseuds/nocturneatmidnight
Summary: Over time, Izumi had formed a sort of mental catalogue of every one of Leo's smiles. There were the ones that spread wide over his cheeks and crinkled at the corners of his eyes when he was positively overjoyed about something, and the ones that were teasing and mischievous, usually followed by Izumi getting jumped by a certain green-eyed gremlin. The ones that bared teeth in ways that were confident and almost feral, only shown towards opponents Knights had sworn to slaughter, and the ones that were kind and easy, which Leo wore when he saw a puppy rolling around in the dirt outside, or something equally soft and cheesy. (Or when he looked at Izumi. Sometimes. Often.)And then there were the smiles that were so obviously, painfullyfake,like the one Leo was showing him right now.
Relationships: Sena Izumi/Tsukinaga Leo
Comments: 18
Kudos: 68





	eight hours away

**Author's Note:**

> welcome to the second installment of Fics I Finished At 3am leo stole all my mf dias and DIDN'T COME HOME and now hiiro's got this gorgeous scout going on and i can't pull. i am in so much pain leo why

Sometimes, when Leo smiled, Izumi wondered if he was just seeing things.

Years had passed, but to this very day, Izumi could still perfectly visualise the world in all of its darkened glory. Frame by frame, the way it’d been back then, after the hell that had been so cleverly, cruelly dubbed _Checkmate-_ during those agonising months when the king had left his castle, and his knights had fallen to ruin. Those months where Izumi had walked the school corridors wearing nothing but guilt and silence on his sleeve to compensate for the heart he’d left with a certain someone, those moments when every aspect of his life had gone cold and grey without the presence of the brightest soul he'd ever met by his side. When he’d turn to mumble some half-witted comment to someone who’d become a constant in that fickle illusion he called a reality, or nudge that same someone in the side to show him something Izumi knew he’d like- only to look over his shoulder and find that there was no one there at all.

No one there _anymore,_ rather.

The cock robin had been slaughtered, and perhaps it’d been almost laughably easy to do it. The months following the burial were fully drained of any colour or song, and the world came to a steady, halting stop.

Time passed, and Izumi bore his way through it. He drew his sword for the sake of others, others he _loved,_ and prepared himself for the possibility of being thrown into the deepest of dungeons for his treason. He fought, holding on to the hope that his king would return, one day, and find his castle not the same as the way he’d left it but _better,_ filled with something else rather than hate and revulsion and all those restless things their king hated so much. Izumi would duel not for himself, but for the king who had abandoned his knights.

Knights were meant to be loyal to a fault, anyway.

The cock robin was cremated in a hurried fashion, its ashes drifting away in the gentle breeze. Those ashes found themselves scattered in a thousand different places over the land, even crossing borders and making their way across the globe-

And then the bird was reborn. Tiny and frail, needing the help of its mother to take baby steps, to learn to fly again. It took weeks upon weeks, but eventually…

The bird spread its wings, and came back to Izumi. Landed on his shoulder, tittering curiously at what the once-familiar land had become in its absence, a little unsteady with its flight and song yet stronger and more tenacious than ever before. Izumi embraced the creature, holding it tight to his chest and vowing to never let it go the way he had before.

More time passed, and life progressed into a new normal. A normal that involved doodles over classroom walls and used paper scattered over floors, a normal that came in the form of orange hair tied in an achingly familiar ponytail and melodies filling the air at nearly every instant.

A normal that involved Tsukinaga Leo. (A normal that Izumi never, _ever_ wanted to go without.)

They graduated in a whirl of flushed cheeks and newly written songs, and then Izumi had left Japan to pursue his modelling career. Leo had done the same with his composing, and just like that, their paths diverged, it only in the slightest. Still, Izumi found the time and blessing to be able to see what he loved most in the world, what at some point, he’d thought for sure he’d be going the rest of his life without experiencing ever again- Leo’s smiles.

Over time, Izumi had formed a sort of mental catalogue of every one of Leo's smiles. There were the ones that spread wide over his cheeks and crinkled at the corners of his eyes when he was positively overjoyed about something, and the ones that were teasing and mischievous, usually followed by Izumi getting jumped by a certain green-eyed gremlin. The ones that bared teeth in ways that were confident and almost feral, only shown towards opponents Knights had sworn to slaughter, and the ones that were kind and easy, which Leo wore when he saw a puppy rolling around in the dirt outside, or something equally soft and cheesy. (Or when he looked at Izumi. Sometimes. Often.)

And then there were the smiles that were so obviously, painfully _fake,_ like the one Leo was showing him right now.

Even through video call, Izumi would have to be off his rocker not to recognise one of Leo's deliberately plastered on smiles the way he usually did. From the looks of it, Leo was in their shared apartment in Florence- the layout of the bedroom Leo was situated in was one Izumi had woken up to a thousand times. (One Izumi much preferred as compared to the utterly tasteless, _Leo-less_ dorm he was currently residing in back at ES.) Leo was lying flat on their bed, bright hair splayed out over cream-coloured duvet and countless sheets of manuscript paper that had been scribbled over in different coloured pens. Leo held the phone high up over his head with one hand, having just greeted Izumi with a _good morning_ that told Izumi that for Leo, this morning probably hadn’t been any good at all.

“Sena?” Leo’s overexaggerated grin fell slightly at Izumi’s lack of reply. “Everything okay?”

Izumi caught himself worrying at his bottom lip between his teeth, and immediately ceased the action. It wouldn’t be fitting for a model to have torn and bitten lips, after all. “I could ask you the same question, Leo-kun.”

Leo blinked at him, looking taken aback for a moment- and then he was pulling a smile on again, giving a laugh that sounded far too hollow to Izumi’s ears. “I’m great, Sena! Everything’s great. Florence is really fun, you know? Just this morning, I found a cat hiding in a bouquet of flowers someone abandoned at the side of the road! The cat ran away when I came close, though. You know-”

“Leo-kun-”

“-They just left the flowers there, Sena. The bouquet. It was all ratty and rotten and dead- do you think its owners threw it away before it started rotting, or after?” There was another burst of laughter, and the camera trembled, throwing Leo’s expression out of focus. Izumi felt his chest tighten, his throat close up _._ “Hey, Sena, do you think the flowers were pretty? Maybe that’s all they were good for, though, so their owners didn’t want them anymore! Nobody likes things that don't _do_ anything, you know?”

 _Crap._ This wasn’t good. “Leo-kun, when was the last time you slept?”

“Hmm?” Leo’s lips curved downwards in a slight pout. His eyes traveled away from the phone in favour of gazing up at the ceiling, no doubt thinking back to the past couple of days for an answer. The camera steadied itself, a little closer to Leo’s face this time, and Izumi could just make out the dark smudges beneath Leo’s eyes that were probably natural, unlike the pen marks and smears of graphite that decorated the rest of Leo’s face. The fact that Leo was taking this long to reply...

“Ah~ Sena, I don’t remember!” Leo flung his hands out by his sides, altering Izumi’s view from his boyfriend’s face to wooden floor panelling that was covered in even more paper than the bed. Each sheet was a mess of cancelled-out music notes and key signatures, once-blank staves now marred in a havoc of black ballpoint and rainbow magic markers. Countless compositions, each and every one rejected- a few of them were even ripped in places from where nibs had been pressed too hard.

Izumi turned to glance at the calendar on his bedside table. Two more days. Two more days, and then it’d be Saturday, and Izumi would be on his scheduled flight back to Florence. Back to _Leo,_ who seemed to be slowly but surely falling into a sort of disarray that tore straight into Izumi’s chest and dug at the inner workings of that frantic, thumping organ he called a heart.

Quiet. It was too quiet. “Leo-kun?” Izumi called out, forcing his voice steady. “Leo-kun, are you-”

There was the sound of crinkling paper, and then the camera was being lifted up again. Leo sighed, and Izumi’s view through the rectangular pane went from blurry multicolour to white and orange and black. A familiar combination, one that belonged to that trademark hoodie Leo was so fond of wearing. There were a few teal stripes at the corner of the camera as well, and Izumi recognised the garment’s breast pocket within seconds- was Leo holding the phone to his chest, or something?

Izumi might have found the action endearing were it not for Leo’s next words. “The inspiration here… there’s something off about it, Sena.”

“...Off about it,” Izumi repeated, gripping his phone a little tighter. “What does that mean?”

He was met with a few more beats of silence, and then- “I don’t know. Isn’t it weird?” There was a bubble of laughter that was too loud, too on edge, before Leo went rambling on. “It’s weird, right, Sena? I don’t know. I can’t think, I can’t write, I can’t compose, and I don’t know why! The music’s strange, Sena, it’s sounding all messy and ugly and disjointed and _stupid_ in my head. I can’t think of music, but I can’t think of anything else, and sometimes I hear...”

A chill crept up Izumi’s spine, something crawling under his skin and lodging itself deep in his fragile bones. His heart began to race almost painfully quick, nails digging into the skin of his palm as he willed the hand holding his phone not to shake. He knew what was coming, the words having been burned into his brain from the day he’d first heard them- from the day he’d first paid Leo a visit to witness his descent into madness, a madness engineered by their school’s most ruthless.

“...There are voices, Sena. They’re screaming and shouting and booing- they won’t let me write. Why won’t they let me write?” The camera trembled slightly, like Leo was holding onto his phone just as tight as Izumi was holding onto his own. His voice came tighter, quieter in almost a whisper, so unlike the Tsukinaga Leo who was always so bright and free-spirited, unbound and uncontrolled to the point where Izumi had to reign him in. “Sena, they’re not stopping, they won’t- why won’t they? They’re not stopping, Sena, shut _up,_ they _won’t shut up-”_

 _“Leo-kun,”_ Izumi interrupted, hearing panic seep into his own voice as he jumped to his feet to- something, _anything,_ but what could he do when he was six thousand miles away? “Leo, I need you to stay calm, okay? Leo? Leo-kun. Hey, Leo-”

There was a soft gasp, and the camera shifted and plunged into black. _Fuck, shit-_ Izumi’s fingers were awkward and clumsy, all of a sudden, as he frantically tapped at his phone to check whether-

The call disconnected with a faint _beep._

 _“Leo-kun!”_ Izumi shouted into the empty air, despite knowing that what with the seas that separated Japan and Florence, the chances of Leo hearing him were null. He pressed the call button beneath Leo’s contact, and listened to the phone ring and ring- only for his call to go to voicemail. He called again, again, _again-_

Nothing, nothing, nothing. Frustration boiled up in Izumi’s chest as he listened to Leo’s custom-set voice message for the fourth time in a row. It was all eager confidence and easy laughter, and Izumi remembered the day Leo had recorded it as clearly as he remembered his own name- upon hearing a client’s voicemail, Leo had, of course, decided that he wanted to create one of his own. He’d gone all the way across ES to get to Izumi’s dorm and drag him outside for help, and they’d gone through a billion retakes before Leo was satisfied. Izumi had rolled his eyes and made it clear that every time would be the _last time, Leo-kun,_ but in his heart, he’d been glad- glad that Leo was happy, glad that Leo trusted him enough to choose _him,_ of all people, to take voice clip after voice clip with (when really, he could’ve asked anyone else), glad that Leo was smiling so radiantly, so unabashedly with every joke and mishap, the pure joy on his face so painfully honest and _familiar_ that Izumi had ceaselessly wondered if he was dreaming.

Dreaming of their golden days back at Yumenosaki, the days before the hell of the war they’d been thrown into head-first and had barely come out of alive. (Izumi dreamed of those days often. Sometimes consciously, head in the clouds during commutes between jobs or other activities, and sometimes when his mind was blank and he was fast asleep, only to be awoken hours later in the dead of the night panting, gasping, clutching at his chest for whatever it was that had been ripped out of it when Leo had fallen, when Leo had left.)

_Come back. Come back to me, stay this time-_

But Leo was in Florence right now, and if anyone should be being told to come back, it was Izumi himself. He glanced over at his clock- mere minutes had passed, but not knowing what sort of feverish state Leo was currently in made it as good as hours. Izumi’s gaze flicked from the clock to his calendar, then back again.

He lifted his phone and selected one of the numbers he had at the very top of his contact list. The receiver’s phone rang once, twice-

“Hello? Izumi-chan?”

Izumi’s chest flooded with relief- not that he’d ever tell his (sometimes) cocky junior _that._ “Naru-kun. I need you to cover for me for tomorrow's job. Meet me at my dorm in five minutes, and I’ll tell you what you need to know, okay?”

Without waiting for an answer, Izumi hung up. Tossing his phone onto the bed, he got up and strode over to his dresser- he had things to pack.

•••

Fifteen hours, forty-six minutes and seven seconds later, Izumi was touching down in Florence.

He’d tried to catch some sleep on the flight, but a myriad of mental images detailing what Leo could be going through right now prevented him from doing any more than closing and resting his eyes for a few minutes at a time. He was one of the first few passengers to get out of the plane and make it to the baggage pick-up, quickly scanning the area for his suitcase, grabbing it and getting the hell out of the airport. Hailing a cab and giving the driver the address to his and Leo’s apartment, Izumi dialled Leo for the hundredth time in less than twenty-four hours.

And for the hundredth time, Leo didn’t pick up.

 _Maybe he’s just sleeping,_ a small, hopeful part of Izumi suggested. _Maybe his phone is off. Maybe he got a burst of inspiration, the decent kind, and ended up immersed in his compositions for hours and hours. He never answers his phone, then._

But every other _sane_ part of Izumi knew that this was nothing but wishful thinking- flowery, fictitious, and utterly useless. Something was wrong, and Izumi...

Izumi wasn’t there to fix it. Just like he hadn’t been there to patch Leo up in their second year, leading to Leo’s inevitable downfall. He’d been so close to him, back then, closer to Leo than any other person had been- and yet he’d let Leo drown. He’d ignored the signs and failed to protect the person who had given his all to protect _him,_ only taking and taking, yet not giving a single thing in return. He’d let Leo crash and burn, not lifting a finger to even try to slam on the brakes.

Sitting alone in the backseat of the cab, now, listening to Leo’s voicemail which had become ingrained into his mind with the sheer number of times it had played, Izumi was every bit as useless as he’d been all those years ago.

_“You’ve reached the genius composer, Tsukinaga Leo! If I’m not answering the phone right now-”_

_You aren’t,_

_“-it means I’m probably composing, or something-”_

_You’re not,_

_“-so either leave a message-”_

_I did,_

_“-or come find me yourself!”_

_I’m trying._

He was trying. He was trying, he was _trying-_

“We’ve arrived, sir.”

Izumi shoved the appropriate amount of money into the cab driver’s hand, rushing out his thanks in the most basic Italian his brain could muster. Then he was getting out of the cab, grabbing his bags and jogging towards the apartment, mind a frantic whirl of _LeoLeoLeo._ The elevator took years to make it up to the right floor, and when he finally reached the door labelled _0505,_ his hands trembled so badly he could barely fit the key into its slot.

The sun had set long ago here in Florence, and the apartment was lit by nothing but the dim glow of the moon (as well as a couple of streetlights) when Izumi finally got the door open. No curtains had been drawn, and the place was eerily quiet. Izumi shut the door soundlessly behind him and left his luggage by the entrance- he’d deal with it later. Right now…

He could vaguely make out the shapes of scrapped paper and even notebook covers strewn all over the floors, ghostly white over dark mahogany. The kitchen countertop was bare save a single glass, and when Izumi padded over to tip it to the side, he found it completely dry. If Leo had drank from this glass, it hadn’t been anytime recently. Izumi took a step back- only to nearly trip over something on the ground. He bent over to pick it up, fingers meeting cool felt- a marker, then. One that didn’t have a drop of ink left to its name, all offered up to the hands of a crazed genius.

A genius who, to Izumi’s observation, wasn’t anywhere in the main living area of their apartment.

The hands on Izumi’s watch ticked closer and closer to one in the morning with every passing moment, and Izumi moved ahead. He checked the study, first, and came up fruitless- there were more papers, an empty drink can, a whiteboard scribbled over in black and red- but no Leo. The bathroom left him equally empty-handed, which meant…

Izumi quietly turned the knob of his and Leo’s bedroom door, willing the mechanism not to make as much of a click. On the off-chance that Leo was actually sleeping, Izumi didn’t want to disturb him, and on the much larger chance that Leo was awake, startling him might prove disastrous. The door opened silently, and Izumi entered the room, shutting it behind him with an identical amount of care.

And there was Tsukinaga Leo, huddled up in the far corner of the room, hood drawn over his head as he hunched over whatever it was he was scribbling on a fresh sheet of paper. The only source of light came from a tiny lamp on the bedside table, which definitely wasn’t enough to make Izumi think that Leo wasn’t wrecking his eyes working in this kind of environment, but all in all- this seemed okay. Suspiciously okay, even. Leo seemed to be doing just-

“No. No, no- no, no, no-”

-Okay, Leo was _not_ doing just fine.

Izumi took a tentative step forward, watching as Leo scratched over a line of music notes. “Leo-kun?” he called out softly. “Leo-kun, can you h-”

 _“No,”_ Leo muttered, and then he was sitting up, crumpling the paper in his fist and tossing it aside. “Can’t, shut up, _shut up-”_

 _Can you hear me,_ was what Izumi had wanted to say- and while Leo’s words could be taken as replies to Izumi’s, the silver haired knew better than to assume this was the case. “Leo-kun,” he said again, taking another step closer. He raised his voice just the tiniest bit in an attempt to get through whatever it was that was blocking Leo’s senses from the rest of the world. “Hey. _Leo-kun.”_

Leo grabbed another sheet of paper from the rapidly diminishing stack by his side, and started writing again.

“Leo.”

Another line, another scribble, another paper balled up and discarded.

_“Leo.”_

Frantic mumbling, head-shaking, hands being lifted to lips to be sunk into with teeth-

 _“No!”_ Izumi surged forwards, body seized with mindless panic that washed up his throat and nearly left him choking, the instinctive tenseness in his body its only warning. He dropped to his knees before Leo and wrenched his palms away from harm, holding them so tightly in his own grip it felt like they might snap. Leo’s head jolted upwards, red and bitten lips slightly parted, eyes wide and unseeing even as they fixed on Izumi’s-

And he screamed.

Leo _screamed,_ the sound sharp and grating to Izumi’s ears. He scrambled backwards, nearly hitting his head against the wall behind him as he frantically tugged at his wrists to try to escape Izumi’s grip, but Izumi held fast. Leo’s eyes were darting back and forth, left and right, every possible direction in the room, yet they held no sense of thought or deliberation. These were the eyes of someone _gone,_ someone so far away Izumi could scarcely dare to hope he’d be able to call him home, someone who had to be held onto or else he would _leave again,_ he’d leave Izumi and he’d never come back-

“Shut _up,”_ Leo shrieked, and then he was kicking his legs out, fighting Izumi with all of his might- which wasn’t much to speak of, given that he probably hadn’t eaten since yesterday. Still, it was as if a jagged blade had sunk itself into Izumi’s chest, tearing flesh and leaving something so painstakingly _empty_ there it sucked all the air from Izumi’s lungs and left him gasping for breath. Leo screamed again, nearly knocking Izumi in the jaw as he flailed in his grip. “Shut up, leave me alone, _leave me alone-”_

 _“Leo-kun,”_ Izumi got out, and the blade in his chest twisted, twisted. “Leo-kun, it’s me, it’s-”

“SHUT UP!” In some feat of some superhuman strength, Leo broke free of Izumi’s grip, scrambling as far back against the wall as he could go. He looked _afraid,_ the expression something Izumi loathed to put on Leo’s face, had never wanted to see there again- and yet here it was, like a taunting recording of everything he thought he’d left in the past. “Shut up, shut up-” Leo clamped his palms over his ears, and in the new angle, the backs of his hands caught illumination from the watching lamp.

Izumi’s breath caught in his throat. Leo’s hands were raw and bitten, stained with teeth marks and dried blood. What Izumi had jumped to avoid had already occurred- and was it just Izumi’s overactive imagination, or were there really traces of scarlet dying Leo’s canines as he opened his mouth to speak again?

“Stop,” Leo mumbled, his entire body trembling as he curled up into a ball, knees tucked up tight to his chest and shoulders shaking. “I can’t- shut up, please- I’ll write, I’ll write- I’ll write a masterpiece-”

Tears fell down Leo’s cheeks, and Izumi’s heart contorted into some painful sort of shape, squeezing itself so tightly he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. He instinctively reached out a hand to Leo, only to freeze when it was halfway through the air. Could he even…

Could he even do anything, here?

“I’m sorry,” Leo gasped suddenly, diminutive body rocking back and forth, back and forth. His eyes were squeezed shut, lips bloody and being bitten down on between words. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry- I’ll write- it’ll be good, I’ll- I’ll make it- I’m sorry, Sena, I’m _sorry-”_

_Ah._

If Leo wasn’t even conscious of Izumi physically _being_ here, then-

“What are you seeing?” Izumi asked quietly, helplessly, even as he knew that Leo wouldn’t be able to hear him. Leo was lost in some sort of fantasy dreamland- or more likely a nightmare, one that lurked at the back of his mind with every waking moment, simply waiting to be called upon in moments of weakness. “Leo-kun. Leo-kun-”

He pushed his fears aside and slowly, carefully pressed two fingertips to Leo’s shoulder.

Leo jumped, breath hitching, eyes flying open. His gaze fluctuated, moving from his knees to the floor to _Izumi_ to the door to the bed and-

Back to Izumi again.

Lips parted, and something flickered in his eyes. “...Sena?”

Leo’s voice came out hoarse, croaky, yet beautiful all the same. It was like a first breath of fresh air after spending hours underwater, struggling to keep his lungs afloat. Izumi allowed himself the briefest moment of relief, of knowing that Leo was here, Leo was _back._

“Yeah,” Izumi said quietly, the word coming in a single exhale. “It’s me. Sena. I’m here, Leo-kun.”

“Call me...”

The name alone was still foreign on his lips, despite the way it sometimes slipped out without him noticing, anyway. “Leo. I’m right here.”

Izumi shifted a little closer to wrap his arms around Leo, the latter slowly unfolding his knees to curl around Izumi in a tight embrace. Leo was _freezing,_ maybe even unnaturally so, and Izumi was willing to give up every ounce of his own warmth if it meant easing that cold just a little.

Minutes passed as Izumi rubbed Leo’s back and murmured soft reassurances, waiting for his tears to dry up and his shaking to cease. He kissed his head and wiped at his cheeks, straightened his clothes and smoothed down hair. Leo made no protests and exhibited no resistance, not saying another word until finally, finally-

“Sena.”

“Yeah, Leo-kun?”

Leo made a quiet, grumpy sound, and Izumi hurried to remedy his mistake. “Leo.”

There was a soft hum in response, and then it was quiet again. Izumi waited.

“You weren’t here earlier.”

The words were spoken quietly, nothing but a half-observation by a half-asleep boy, something so blatantly known and obvious it shouldn't have mattered at all. And yet…

“You weren’t here, Sena. Did you- was it- was this how you felt when I left you?”

_Was this how-_

The pain of Leo leaving had been burning, excruciating. But that had been Izumi’s own fault, the burden to be carried on his own shoulders. Now, Leo was feeling the same sort of pain, thinking it’d been meant as a retribution, perhaps- because to him, Izumi had left in a similar fashion, when really-

“I didn’t leave you, Leo,” Izumi said quietly, gently brushing a stray lock of hair from Leo’s forehead. “I’ll never leave you. I came as fast as I could.” A kiss to his temple, just a faint brush of lips over skin. “The furthest I’ll ever be is just eight hours away, okay?”

It might have been one in the morning in Florence, now, the world bathed in moonlight- but back in Japan, the sun had already risen. Nine o’clock. Which meant that all of a difference there was was just...

“...Eight hours?”

“Yeah.” Izumi could feel Leo’s heartbeat calming, returning to its usual, kind rhythm. “Eight hours. That’s all, Leo.”

Leo lapsed into silence once more, and Izumi didn’t disturb him. “Sena?”

“Mm?”

Leo pressed his face to the crook of Izumi’s neck, nose cold as he nuzzled closer. “Sleep?”

A simple, straightforward request- one Izumi could easily grant. He nodded, carefully gathering Leo in his arms (Leo clinging onto him, arms around shoulders and legs around his waist like he’d been made to fit there) before lifting him up and walking over to the bed. He set Leo down at the foot of the mattress, letting him sit with his ankles still somewhat hooked around Izumi, seemingly unwilling to let go. Izumi cleared all the scribbled-out compositions from the bed, making sure the sheets were completely devoid of paper before returning to Leo.

All it took was a soft call of his name for Leo to open his arms like he was asking for a hug. Izumi obliged, shifting to let Leo curl up in his arms again before relocating him to the middle of the bed, where they usually slept. He got them both under the covers with minimal difficulty (this was far from his first time maneuvering a cuddly, half-conscious Leo to bed) before letting out a soft sigh. All was quiet, in a more content manner, now- Leo’s hand loosely gripped at the back of Izumi’s shirt, head pillowed against his chest. His lips were still dark with dried blood and his hands would have to be properly treated and disinfected when they woke up, but for now...

Reaching out a hand by muscle memory, Izumi flicked off the lamp on the bedside table.

The questions would come tomorrow morning- the tricky discussions, the painful truths. They’d have to figure things out, make it through whatever setbacks they’d just experienced. Together. The both of them. They’d figure things out.

But for now, they’d sleep.


End file.
